Lakota Prayer

During the last few years, I have been sourcing my prayers from a variety of ethnic, cultural, and religious traditions.

Sometimes the prayers are as good as – or better than – the Bible!

But that makes perfect sense to me, because I take literally and seriously the declarations of the Bible that Jesus has created all things and is holding all things together (Col. 1), that “in him we move and have our being” (Acts 17 – note: a quote from a Greek philosopher which found its way in to the Bible), and that in Jesus the true light that gives light to everyone was coming into the world (John 1).

Anyway – here is a Lakota prayer translated into English by Lakota Chief Yellow Lark. Yellow Lark lived through the peak of the Plains Wars and the forced confinement of the Lakota onto reservations (such as Pine Ridge in South Dakota). He witnessed the drastic disruption of traditional nomadic life, cultural suppression, and the loss of ancestral lands.

Oh, Great Spirit, Whose voice I hear in the winds,

And whose breath gives life to all the world,

Hear me. I come to you as one of your many children.

I am small and weak.

I need your strength and wisdom.

Let me walk in beauty and make my eyes ever behold the red and purple sunset.

Make my hands respect the things you have made and my ears sharp to hear your voice.

Make me wise, so that I may understand the things you have taught my people.

Let me learn the lessons you have hidden in every leaf and rock.

I seek strength, not to be greater than my brother, but to fight my greatest enemy—myself.

Make me always ready to come to you with clean hands and straight eyes.

So when life fades, as the fading sunset, my Spirit may come to you without shame.

—Prayer translated by Chief Yellow Lark, Lakota, 1887